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Do I have an ant in my teeth?
This is not something I thought I was saying. But I never thought of eating an insect either.
Sitting for BugsGiving last week, taking a sip of my gin and cricket cocktail, I really could not believe that I had the guts to walk into the room. My table companions felt my concern about the 15-course meal that was waiting for us: "The first time you eat insects?" someone asked. Um yes.
BugsGiving was the centerpiece of this year's Brooklyn Bugs Festival, which took place over three days at Brooklyn Kitchen. I only attended that "unique event that aimed to" showcase dishes that reinvent Thanksgiving by using edible insects as the primary source of protein. " Brooklyn Bugs' charismatic chef, chef Joseph Yoon, and his evening partner, chef David George Gordon, who wore a white toque adorned with an antenna, oversaw the festivities.
I was above my head. I knew it as soon as I saw the centipede doing ellipticals in a tupperware near the check-in counter. It was my hint to find the bar as soon as possible.
Oh, and have I already mentioned that I'm a vegetarian?
While I was high and did not eat red meat, I became a full-time vegetarian more than ten years ago volunteering at a wildlife rehabilitation center. One of my tasks was to pick chickens and prepare them for eating owls and eagles, slice intact pieces of cow into digestible bites, and help skinning and cleaning deer. . Prepare meat that remains watched like animals, I realized the Americans' alienation from the sources of their food and the enormous ecological damage that our uncontrolled gluttony is having on us. I decided not to have the right to eat anything if I could not kill it and prepare it myself.
I do not have any reserves of this kind to kill insects.
In 80% of countries, people eat insects, and more than 1,600 different species make their way through the lips of some 2 billion people. Eating insects, it's rude to think that it's rude; if I had lived in Central America or South America, Africa, Asia, or parts of Oceania, that would not have been such a big deal. That being said, I do not think these areas of the world eat exactly the "cricket gougères" and the "green beans with roasted beets and chapulines" on our BugsGiving menu. This part was all Brooklyn
Still, it is a little surprising that eating insects has not yet made its way to the United States. Oxford researchers have discovered that 100 grams of bedbugs contain more protein, calcium and vitamins than 100 grams of chicken or steak. Crickets have 12 times more vitamin B12 than salmon. It is thought that the insect oil is a healthy source of omega-3 elusive fatty acid. Cockroaches could be the next superfood!
Insects are also absurdly durable and have little impact on the environment. In a landmark report released in 2013, the United Nations proposed that insects be a promising remedy to the problem of food shortages, a crisis that will only increase with climate change.
But … what does it really look like? eat an insect?
My first insect of the night was cricket, grinded in a fine dust and mixed in a gin cocktail that I put with distrust with my tongue before confirming that the powder was tasteless (and then I drank avoiding the trim intact cricket). Buzzing with my Jiminy liquid, I went to the appetizers of the night, the first being the donuts of mealworms. After being encouraged by more adventurous consumers, I took a bite. It was … crispy? Most of the time, it looked like a normal donut, provided I ignored the very visible mealworms coming out. May be I could do that.
Then, I put a horn worm on a skewer. If you have never seen a horn worm, imagine a light green version of the cartoon caterpillar Alice in Wonderland, with small fleshy and fleshy legs. This one was impaled on a small pile, charred, and sprinkled with an optimistic chipotle zig-zag. I put it in my mouth and chewed in a hurry. A horn worm accidentally slipped on my tongue. It was cold, almost crazy, pasty. "The horn is good!" In fact, I said my personal eureka aloud. I did not know myself anymore.
We then ate an elite corn salad with chinchuiles (another species of edible caterpillar) and terrestrial Manchurian scorpions perched on top of lotus root chips. Each had a pronounced texture resembling that of seafood; it turns out that the scorpion is closely related to lobster. Many insects have aquatic cousins; Justin Butner, a self-proclaimed "Tap Leader for Insect Farming," sitting at my table, told me that he was allergic to crickets, which I rudely whispered: "How did you find out?" Well, because Orthoptera are closely related to crustaceans and that allergies to one predispose to allergies to each other (another enthusiast I've met, Dave, had once sought to sell crickets to people under the name of "land shrimp").
More food arrived: a pear salad topped with a pile of Changbai ants had a slight citrus taste and was best known for inducing the sensation of chewing a cactus, the bristling sensation coming from hundreds of small legs. The fluffy cricket gudgeons had made me speculate on the viability of cricket chouquettes, and we have pinched big black ants of sweet chimpanzee sticks, their formic flavor being submerged by swell of fennel. Then came dinner: locusts sprang from the orzo and were thrown on skewers. Delicious garlic-crushed potatoes were smeared with super worms. Green beans, roasted beets and grasshoppers have accumulated on my plate. I was doing well until my eyes fell on cranberry relish topped with cockroaches.
Being a New Yorker, I have fought many cockroach wars. This one required another glass. Only once, well numbed by what I was getting ready to do, I stuffed all the virus in my mouth. I chewed ferociously. I took it out on the other side.
Dessert appeared in the form of incredibly complex salt marshmallows of Gusano Sal with Sombra Mezcal and a bowl of ice cream topped with powdery cranberry granola – now no problem for me. The finale was a feast of figs with gorgonzola, honey and wasps.
To mix the metaphors, I was caught hook, line and lead. I am not sure what is the equivalent of an insect in pescetarianism – entotarianism? – but I want to be thisI decided. Not everyone was so excited about my discovery. "Very good to brush your teeth, okay?" my boyfriend asked delicately. "OMG" replied my mother before I stopped responding to my photos. "I ate bugs tonight! And it rained!" I announced to my driver Lyft who, probably fearing for his safety, remained silent.
The next morning, my enthusiasm had … marked. I woke up because of stomach cramps and excruciating nausea. After sending an e-mail to my boss (which was essentially "DO NOT COME TO WORK, EMPTYED BY BUGS"), I curled up for several miserable hours. I could not understand it; Was I incompatible with my new favorite dish?
I only realized later that maybe it was my vegetarianism that had brought me in. Because insects contain up to 75% protein, my intestine is rebelling: "Making radical changes in one's diet will throw the digestive system out for a loop, at least initially," confirms More. And while munching lobster had been heartbroking for hours, I did not put my reaction in parallel with the seafood allergy warning at the bottom of each menu. In other words, bingeing on BugsGiving may not be the the wisest way to reintroduce meat into your diet.
I am not discouraged, however. After overcoming mental obstacles, which was not easy, I realized that the bugs are good, at least when they are well cooked. The reasons why I am a vegetarian can always be honored by an entotary lifestyle. Plus, it's delicious, like eating seafood without worrying about overfishing or bycatch. If I continue to soften six-legged snacks in my diet, I think I can make it work.
Step by step. Cricket by cricket.
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